When Eve upon the first of men
The apple pressed with specious cant,
Oh! what a thousand pities then
That Adam was not adamant. - Hood

The Fall of Man
04/13/2018

Every educated person in today's society should realize
that the Genesis story of Adam and Eve represents the mythology of the
ancient Hebrew culture. The disciplines of geology, paleontology,
cosmology, archaeology, and anthropology all have significant information that is
incompatible with the story being literal. Also, the story as I learned
it pitted the newest and least sophisticated created being against the
oldest, most intelligent, powerful and experienced. How fair is that?

No, to think about the fall of man we must remove
ourselves from the mythological allegory of the garden of Eden and build
with what we know about the nature of the human psyche and experience,
ALL of the scientific disciplines, and a VALID reconstruction of ancient
times and world changing events.
Various pieces of ancient mythology would now fit and suggest some plausible facets.

One of the ongoing enigmas in Christendom is the
introduction of evil into an otherwise perfect creation, and sometimes
this is referred to as the "mystery of iniquity". Even in the Adam and
Eve account is usually assumed to be the fallen angel Lucifer whose
fall obviously preceded the Edenic account. No Bible author nor Jesus
explains how and why this actually happened. However, understanding the
ultimate issues along with the J person's remarks can give us a general
insight as to how it came about.

In the paradigm being promulgated on this site, the proliferation of humans in the universe
started with the Original, and then two, then four, etc. Part of the
overall plan was to have large families of humans. So we can speculate
that the fall of our family was not initiated by any act of disobedience or conscious
violation of God's spoken will, but by NOT doing something.

Since you cannot
inject equality into another being without them remaining unequal, equality
can only be offered or extended, not imposed. An equal individual must be involved with his
own creation as an equal by choosing at some point to be equal in rights and value
amidst an otherwise ocean of facets of inequalities. Not only is the arrival of
each of us sequential but no two human beings are equal
in any specific dimension or aspect. We can only see ourselves and treat each other
as equals because of our infinite value and potential. The proposal is
that the Originator and the existing families extended equality to
our family, but some one of our original ancestors must have FAILED to choose to be equal,
and thereby began to cling to the idea of inferiority and let it fester.

This failure and this clinging to the feeling of inferiority evidently was
allowed to fester in the heart of this being designed to be
equal, not inferior. Again evidently, this concept must have infected
other members of the family. This would have naturally led to the downward spiral of separation and degeneration.
At some point this unhappy family chose to go their own way. The usual
human reaction when feeling inferior is to try to be superior, and so
they began attempting to be superior by creating an
alternate system, one of predatory competition that crossed the lines and violated
the eternal values. The French would put these values this way: Verité, Liberté,
Egalité, Fraternité, Charité.

The other and more important side of this psychological
development represents a failure to
appreciate, a failure to choose to believe how unflawed, ideal and wonderful the
character of the creator really is. Of course, in order for the creator to be
magnificent his character would have to be one of complete and
perfect sharing, which perforce would include an extension of an offer to have equality and a
relationship characterized by peership. Anything less than this for a
perfect being would fall short of the ideal and would be demeaning. Any
decent parent extends equality to their children at some point, and if
they don't, the relationship is debased and there is much unhappiness.

So, this is the definition of sin, i.e., a holding of a sentiment or concept that falls short
of the actual level of goodness in another person. In this case, thinking
and holding a negative concept that the creator
is offering to his fellow human beings less than complete unity in
equality of value, rights, privilege and potential.

Societies, relationships, transactions, and social interaction—virtually every facet
of our lives—are all built on and take place within some level of trust.
Once this level of trust becomes adulterated relations and interactions
deteriorate and become strained, troublesome and even broken.

Although it may be difficult, imagine a perfect society with an unadulterated
level of trust. In such a case, no one has ever dissembled, no trust has ever been
betrayed, no rupture in the perfect fabric of good will has ever
appeared, and there is no motivation to diminish, hurt or harm anyone
else. Within such a society, feeling inferior would generate resentment,
which would lead to ever greater misunderstandings and eventually
conflict.

With the possibility of this perfect dynamic being breached,
how is the ideal system maintained indefinitely? Through fear of
punishment, automatic or intentional? Or through commitment engendered by
inspiration, love and complete fulfillment?

Presently, in this world, we can hardly
relate to the latter. Most of our societal motivational systems are
based on law and fear of punishment. When was the last time you heard
someone say that we are a nation of inspiration for good behavior
instead of a nation of law against the bad? How much time do you imagine
the United States legislators in the Senate and the Congress spend on
thinking about how to inspire and motivate the citizens and expand trust
and freedom against the time they spend on rules and regulation—law—to
curtail, control and prevent problems? Not even a balance, is there?

Once the perfection of the complete trust is
broken, can it ever be restored? Can it be restored in a way and to a
degree that will preclude it ever being fractured again? If I am a
mature, reasonable, loving man of good will with unimpeachable
integrity, I certainly cannot trust you completely if you do not see me this way,
if you project upon me some level of malfeasance or nefariousness; nor
even if you resent me, don't like and don't love me.

Once we have sunk so low that we cannot even imagine or conceive of
such a perfect system or a flawless originator, the restoration of harmony and unity in the
universe with the creator and his designed system of love and
cooperation cannot be accomplished, on the one hand, without a
demonstration by the creator that removes all doubt of his character, purpose, plan
and values, and on the other
hand, by a willingness to see and understand the full implications by
the created beings exposed to that demonstration. What would such a
demonstration look like? Would it look like the life, message, and
crucifixion of the J-person?

Another paramount question is:
Even if we accept this demonstration, are we framing it properly? What
is God saying to us through such an extreme measure?